China Crowdcrafting Project
An intention, a proposal, a declaration: our brand has “something” for Shanghai
But how do you approach an important international project like that of a society from Brianza which opens in China? BertO's answer is “getting to know people”.
No more or less than what the society from Meda has always done, whatever the market in question. The way in which BertO reaches towards a new territory is never with the pressure of making a sale but through the humility and willingness to understand the families, the men and women who inhabit a particular territory.
When it is a reality a long way from home – whether geographically, culturally or historically – such as China, the question is “how do we do it”?.
But also in these cases, the resources and the ability to communicate are already within us.
In our work, in the craftsmanship which has made our country famous, in our hands.
This is why the way in which BertO is looking towards the Far East today starts from a shared task, a concrete idea to create something working with our hands, together.
Italian hands and Chinese hands, working together side by side with the aim of creating something unique, made-to-measure for the city of Shanghai, but also to get to know each other better.
We want to begin this chapter of our society’s activity with an experience which allows us to approach and to begin to understand our new interlocutors: a Crowd-crafting project, all working together.
This starts just like everything else: with a meeting.
A meeting held during the Furniture Fair with craftsmen, students, families and Chinese entrepreneurs, all thinking together about an idea and then starting to work on it with the aim of reflecting, and then of course realising, a project which is made-to- measure for the inhabitants of Shanghai.
We are lucky enough to already have some friends there (we have been following our dream of Shanghai since 1988!), and now we would like to invite you as well.
It is about dedicating an afternoon, the time for an open discussion sharing ideas about what would be the ideal sofa for someone who lives in Shanghai, the city which is the symbol of China today.
According to us, a sofa is a symbolic piece of furniture and this is why we want to elaborate a concept which starts from this object, a reference point in our everyday life.
An ambitious project?
Certainly.
A project which is at the complete service of everyday Chinese life?
Again certainly.
A project which also needs your point of view?
Absolutely yes.
We hope to have you with us, together with the students of the University of XXX, for these first steps of our journey whose stages touch design and everyday life, artisan craftsmanship and life in the city of Shanghai, the largest metropolis in the world.
It will be a memorable day for us and it would be even better if we could share it with you.
Successively, depending on what emerges in the meeting, we will develop the work phases which will take us all (families, craftsmen and researchers, both Italian and Chinese) to the creation of the prototype of that "Sofa for Shanghai".
With this Crowd-crafting project, we will inaugurate – shared and as authentic as possible – Berto's arrival in China.